What a World
by wneleh
Summary: It wasn't the flying monkeys that had bothered John. A tag to SGA 5x05 "Ghost in the Machine"


What a World

by Helen W.

The gate disengaged, and there was nothing more to do.

They'd killed her, or as close as made no difference. Elizabeth Weir had come to them for help, and they'd killed her.

John finally turned from the gate. "McKay?" He had to hear it from Rodney, one more time.

But the others had, it seemed, fled as quickly as they could.

He activated his comm and snapped, "McKay, where the hell are you?"

It took too long for Rodney to answer, "Getting a cup of coffee, if it's okay with you."

'Getting' meant the cafeteria; damn, the last place John wanted to go. Even at this hour there'd be other people there, and if one of them asked whether she'd really been Elizabeth he'd probably shoot to kill.

Fortunately, Rodney had taken his coffee out onto the nearly-deserted balcony and was sitting alone, scanning a double-columned document on his laptop. From the lack of equations, John assumed it wasn't math or physics; probably more biology.

"I thought you were sure," said John as he rounded the table to take the seat across from Rodney. "You said there was no way they could do it."

"I AM sure," said Rodney. "There's no way the replicators had the technology to build fully organic bodies from the atomic level up. Especially in their present form. If they'd had the ability, they would have developed as a species - or whatever they are - totally differently. And the equipment they requested, all 30 kilos of it? A total joke. They couldn't have done it."

That's what John had needed to hear. "Then why are you still reading papers?"

"Because - because…"

"You're NOT sure, are you?" John stood - he had to - and leaned against the table. "Damn it, McKay, don't lie to me. You AREN'T sure. There might have been a way. If they couldn't do it, there might be a way WE could."

"Yes, Colonel, and tens of thousands of people die a year waiting for donated organs because we have the technology to build them new ones. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense."

"You know better than I do that there's a hell of a lot of tech that doesn't make it to the general population…"

A hand closed on his shoulder and he wheeled around, almost colliding with Ronon; Teyla was close behind. God, he was getting slow. "What the…"

"Sit down, stop yelling at McKay," said Ronon, shoving him into his seat.

All right, he was sitting. "We're just having a conversation," he said.

"Yeah, I heard," said Ronon. "We wanted to know, what's with the monkeys?"

Well, that made no sense. "Huh?"

"You both referred to the creatures we encountered several days ago as 'flying monkeys,'" Teyla elaborated. "And Mr. Woolsey has asked me whether I could describe them further. From his reaction, and yours in the jumper…"

"We're wondering if there's something about flying monkeys we should know," Ronon concluded. "Seen monkeys in movies. They look kinda cute. Surprised I never saw one when I was on Earth."

Rodney closed his computer. "Monkeys aren't squirrels, no matter what Hollywood says."

Which wouldn't make any since to Teyla or Ronon. "What he means is, they don't roam wild in the U.S. or Canada, which is where you've been," he said. "But, yeah, usually they're pretty cute in movies. In reality, I don't know."

"But FLYING monkeys," said Rodney, "they're a different story altogether. See, there's this movie they make Earth kids see once a year from birth, 'The Wizard of Oz,' that has these flying monkeys who work for the Wicked Witch of the West."

"Wizards and Witches - does have something to do with Harry Potter?" Teyla asked.

"Not at all," said Rodney. "Actually, they were originally meant as metaphors. In the text version, which predated the movie we're talking about by decades, the monkeys might have represented politicians, or Native Americans, which is what I think is most likely, or…"

John closed his eyes and tuned Rodney out. God, they'd killed Elizabeth because Mr. Surprise Oz Expert had said there was no way Elizabeth and her new friends would be able to actually build themselves human bodies. So either they were lying now, or they'd get frustrated and become a threat down the road; either way, it was just too dangerous to keep them on Atlantis, too dangerous to let them go free, no matter how much they wanted to have Elizabeth alive and safe and sane.

The space gate may have been Elizabeth's idea, but it was Rodney's rants on the limits of biology that had sealed it. Nobody had wanted to believe that Elizabeth was really herself as much as Rodney had, so when he'd argued that what the replicators planned to do was impossible, John had had to back him.

And now Rodney was talking about recording winged monkey shadow puppets and projecting them for some high school production of 'Oz' he'd worked tech crew on. God.

"We went all-out with the special effects," Rodney said, "because they're not a large part of the movie, but they're what every kid remembers most. The flying monkeys. Right, Sheppard?"

John opened his eyes and shook his head; say 'flying monkeys' and he thought 'Wizard of Oz,' but the monkeys weren't what had made him cry, sitting with Dave in the dollar theatre with his feet dangling and gum stuck to his elbow. "The monkeys didn't really bother me."

"Really?" said Rodney. "Nonono, I bet you LIKED them, because of the flying."

John shrugged. Maybe that was it, who the hell knew. "What got me was" - and he couldn't believe he was really going to say this - "when the witch of the west died."

Rodney looked at him like he was crazy. "Ding dong, the witch was dead. What's wrong with that?"

"I couldn't believe they couldn't save her," he said. A little water, and she'd melted. 'What a world,' she'd cried. She could have been changed, he could see it in her eyes, and they'd never even tried. 'What a world.'

John closed his eyes again.

"Oh, God, John," he heard Rodney say. "I'm sorry. God…"

And now he was being yanked half out of his chair, pulled close by Ronon, who couldn't have any idea what they were talking about. How could he be showing so much?

A scrape of a chair, and he felt Rodney on his other side grasping his shoulder, and Teyla close in from behind.

"They came here because they were in pain," said Teyla. "That, at least, has ended." But they couldn't know that.

What a world it was, where all their choices were terrible.

THE END

All feedback welcomed.


End file.
